The Hague Tribunal dismissed a motion by Radovan Karadzic’s defence to have the prosecution remove from the indictment all incidents for which it failed to present “sufficient evidence”.
The presiding judge of the Trial Chamber, O-Gon Kwon, explained the decision by saying that the motion by the defence of the former president of Republika Srpska was rejected because, according to the Hague Tribunal’s rules, there is a possibility of dismissing “only counts of the indictment, not individual incidents.”
“There may be instances in which even though the evidence is not necessarily sufficient in respect to some allegations set out in the Indictment in respect of a count, this evidence is capable of supporting a conviction on a particular count,” reads the explanation of the Trial Chamber.
Karadzic announced he would file a motion on June 11 to the Hague Tribunal in order to be released from the charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and the violation of rules and customs of war, after the Hague Prosecution finished its evidence hearing.
According to the ICTY, Karadzic claims that the prosecutors failed to prove he was guilty in the two-year long evidence hearing which ended on May 4.
It is expected that the prosecution will respond to this request on June 13, and the Trial Chamber will make a decision at a later date.
Karadzic is charged with genocide in Srebrenica and seven other municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, expulsion of Bosniaks and Croats in much of Bosnia, terror against civilians in Sarajevo, and taking members of UN peace forces as hostages, in the period between 1992 and 1995.
The beginning of the defence’s evidence hearing is scheduled for October 16. The trial began in late 2009, and the first witness for the Hague prosecution was examined in April of the following year.
To the media in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the arrest of Radovan Karadzic, indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity, was a true sensation, and one to be exploited day after day.
In July 1995 Srebrenica was shelled and occupied by the Army of Republic of Srpska,VRS, despite being declared a protected area by the United Nations. More than 7,000 people were killed, the victims of genocide.